How Digital Nomadism Will Change The World
Information about the definition of a digital nomad, attractive remote work, liberating time and space, the New Rich, and how to become a digital nomad is everywhere on the Internet in 2024.
Does anyone know how those digital nomads got to this point?
Let’s dive in.
Part 1: The Story of the Economy
About six million years ago, a female great ape had two children. One of her children would go on to become the common ancestor of all chimpanzees. The other becomes the common ancestor of the entire human race.
We’re not quite sure why, but over the next six million years, our ancestral line started to do something no creatures on Earth had ever done before—they defined something called money.
It happened slowly and gradually through the thousands of generations, the same way they created tools and math. Our ancestors used “money” to exchange food or most things others owned.
As their own income increased, some of our ancestors suddenly realized, I am rich; I can just give money to others and ask them to do things for me, like cook for me or sow for me. Then came labor.
Then came cities, government, business, and banks. We become more and more civilized, but the economy is still the same thing: a connected system of labor, exchange, and consumption, formed from human action and driven by increased productivity.
Since the first industrial revolution, more advanced tools like steamers have freed people’s hands, and more people are working on their minds. The theories scientists built at this time would make a lot of difference in the future.
Then everything just goes so fast.
A century ago, it was the age of manufacturing, where most people earned their living by making “stuff.”
Theories developed by scientists hundreds of years ago, such as fluid mechanics, have narrowed the distance between everyone on the planet. By the 1950s, trade had become more globalized, and we started doing business with people far far away from us.
At this time, lots of introverted and unsociable geeks start working on something called the "Internet”. And when the era of the Internet comes, we enter a new economy where technology has wiped out many traditional jobs, particularly in manufacturing.
You can call this period Web 1.0, where everyone can find information online easily.
Then comes the Creator Economy, which doesn’t totally coincide with the invention of the internet, however. Indeed, you can say that it matches up with Web 2.0—a point where all of us discovered we could actually earn money online.
It took a while before people discovered the internet’s true potential, and that changed everything.
It’s the first time that everyone who has talent can post their work and let everyone know. From the perspective of people from 100 years ago, it’s unrealistic.
Part 2: The Story of Digital Nomads
We all know what digital nomads look like: a guy or girl sitting by the pool or the ocean, a tropical drink beside an open laptop, a camera taking all of the scene, and this picture will be posted on Instagram in 2 minutes with the comment “🌴💻Digital Nomads Life 💻 🌴”
The earliest digital nomad, though, wasn’t equipped with a smartphone or a laptop. Between 1983 and 1991, Steven K. Roberts traveled 17,000 miles across America on a bicycle as a nomadic freelance tech writer.
A few years after he completed his journey, the term “digital nomad” was jotted down for the first time in a 1997 academic textbook of the same name by Tsugio Makimoto, a Japanese technologist. In the front of the book, he said:
“Technology does not cause change but it amplifies change. Early in the next millennium it will deliver the capability to live and work on the move. …People will therefore be able to ask themselves, ‘Am I a nomad or a settler?’ For the first time in 10,000 years that choice will become a mainstream lifestyle option.”
In 1997, Jobs just returned to Apple again as CEO, and it’s still 11 years before the world is crazy about the extremly thin laptop and people carry it all over the place. So nobody really gives a fuck except for some guys who are really crazy about the Internet.
Then the book The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferris was published in 2007 (the same year Jobs unveiled the first iPhone), and blow, it’s the first time everyone realized that someone lived a life like this. Its core argument is that instead of waiting until you are too old to enjoy the world, you can enjoy it right now and leave everything for the internet to handle.
By the way, his life is almost like dropshipping everything, which is so capitalism.
I think there must have been many people at that time who ignored this book because it’s so unreal to believe. But when the Dutch guy Pieter Levels, a self-taught coder, decided he would launch 12 startups in 12 months while he traveled from place to place, everyone got to believe it. His experience inspired so many people that I highly recommend reading some blogs about it.
The thing is, while he kept hearing about The 4-Hour Workweek, he assessed that the business of dropshipping was “bullshit” and definitely not his scene. He wants to make an honest living, learn by doing, solve real problems, and create things of value. Levels’s interest was in bootstrapping, not dropshipping, and as he put it in his book, MAKE (2018):
“Having some positive influence on people’s lives is a lot more interesting to me than more revenue.”
Then things developed so quickly, and before we could realize it, the idea of being a digital nomad was all over the internet. Media brands from Wired to the BBC to CNN ran stories on nomads, and Nomad List (one of Pieter Levels’ 12 startups) became both a resource for and a symbol of a new global subculture.
And since he logs all of his experience on his blog, many people copy his path and do it again. Like this dude.
After all, it is so cool to enjoy the experience of traveling, and there is no need to go to a specific place at a specific time to earn money, as long as internet access is stable.
And the crazy thing about it is that the income that we make online is mostly passive income, which means that after the extremely hard time at the beginning, the money just comes to your pocket automatically, as long as you set it right. Those jobs are like: freelance writer, startup, vlogger/youtube content creator…
It sounds so wonderful, but I think it would be really, really, really difficult to get started with. Even for Pieter Levels, only 4 of his 70 projects he ever did made money and grew. So don’t just believe it utterly and quit your stable job.
In the 1960s, the science fiction writer Arthur C.Clarke predicted the emergence of global remote work, speaking specifically about nomads working from Bali in the 2010s.
That’s impressive, but what about the next 50 years?
Part 3: The Story of the Future
There are youtubers who think that the digital nomads dreams are dead; there are youtubers who say that you should go for it bravely; some even say everybody should go for it.
But the truth is, nobody knows. Those advices were given by strangers who don’t even give a shit about your future.
Besides, there were many irresponsible predictions that happened in the past.
“The horse is here to stay but the automobile is only a novelty — a fad.”
-The president of the Michigan Savings Bank, 1903.
”Television won’t last because people will soon get tired of staring at a plywood box every night.”
-Darryl Zanuck, movie producer, 20th Century Fox, 1946.
”There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home.”
-Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), 1977.
So if you are considering the digital nomad dream, make a decision yourself, and don’t let anyone stop you.
You can see that every time in human history that people were struck by an idea, it wasn’t because others had reason, but because others actually did the thing that nobody thought would be done and immediately blew everyone’s minds. From the invention of the airplane to the iPhone with touchscreen, Pieter Levels launched 12 startups in 12 months.
Actually, when people are struck by an idea, it’s never a new idea. Long before the Wright brothers, there were people who fantasized about flying in the sky. It's simply that someone actually did that.
While everyone is just loving these great people and their dramatic life experiences, I want to point out that those great people who can change things never put someone in God’s position. I’m just saying don’t be too fundamentalist.
Nobody tells them it could be done; they just did it anyway.
So when you have a unique and crazy idea next time, just do it anyway.
